Whitney Cummings on 'The Female Brain,' Paul Reiser and Challenges as a Director

"I think demystifying the way the brain works really helps us not be such stress cases in relationships. At least that’s what it did for me."

Whitney Cummings takes on the roles of writer, director and star of the upcoming comedy The Female Brain, based on the New York Times best-selling book by Louann Brizendine.

She explains the impact Brizendine’s book had on her during a game of "Finish This Sentence," saying, “After I read the book, I was really passionate about figuring out a way to make that information super accessible to people in a funny, entertaining, but also still smart and scientific way.”

Cummings also credits comedian Paul Reiser and his book Couplehood for inspiring her while growing up. “I would obsess over really trivial things, so I felt like reading that book gave me permission to keep thinking the way I was thinking and to keep complaining about things that weren’t real problems, which is kind of what comedy is sometimes.”

While Cummings has years under her belt in the entertainment industry, The Female Brain is her first credit as a director, which came with a few challenges. “The most challenging day on set as a director was the day I learned that rain machines have two speeds: off and tsunami,” she says. “They don’t tell you this, nobody tells you this. Maybe they do in film school, I don’t know.”